Dissertation Proposal Form

Literature Review

Exploring the knowledge and insights about individual expertise and skill in the workforce below.

Understanding the Single-Skilled Worker 

Single-skilled workers are those individuals who hold education or training in a particular field, their activity is not essentially complicated but commonly centres around conducting repeated tasks these skills are more likely to be changed and advantageous for different jobs (Carson, 2011). Based on how high the individuals’ education is they tend to be less satisfied with their jobs. (Petersen and Puliga, 2017)

Understanding the Multi-Skilled Worker

Multi-skilled workers have a range of additional skills which allow them to easily execute or partake in more than one work activity at a time. Multi-skilled workers are usually less satisfied with their salary in comparison to single-skilled workers. Multi-skilled workers do not receive significantly higher pay than single-skilled labourers – but multi-skilled workers feel they should (Miguélez and Moreno, 2013). Multi-skilled workers are more satisfied with their development potentials as compared to their single-skilled worker counterparts, the general conclusion is that multi-skilling meaningfully increases job approval for only half of the workforce (Carson, 2011).

The research of Carson (2011) quantified multi-skilling as a way for organizations to arrange jobs in such a way that helps to improve productivity, flexibility, and ice quality. Multiskilling can increase the worker’s satisfaction with the job, and it has a great influence on job features and the worker’s worth awareness (Petersen and Puliga, 2017). As per the worker’s viewpoint, multiskilling helps in improving the significance of the task because a multi-skilled worker adds more worth to the employer as well as will advance the general skillsets of the worker, which often leads to higher salary and job variety (Miguélez and Moreno, 2013). 

It has been highlighted that multi-skilled and single-skilled employees get comparable fulfilment from the job. Incomparable manner, the study of Miguélez and Moreno (2013) indicated that the satisfaction level of single-skilled labour alongside multi-skilled labour cannot be identified in the workplace. 

Insourcing and Its Benefits for Upskilling the Workforce

There are many advantages and disadvantages of insourcing and outsourcing where some of the organizational benefits can be a competitive advantage in the industry and privacy of company information (Lam and Khare, 2016). A study conducted by Petersen and Puliga (2017) provided some employee benefits of insourcing, which are the capabilities of the workforce would be improved and there are overall efficiency gains in work execution. It also identified that existing employees were able to perform new tasks increasing their competence while boosting their capabilities to conduct multitasking.

A study conducted by Moe et al (2014) went on to identify a major disadvantage of outsourcing where it could have enlarged costs and complications in controlling the third-party vendor.

The Risk Associated with Outsourcing the Workforce

One of the main disadvantages of outsourcing is the company employees share information with the third-party employees who are providing the services for them (Lockamy III and McCormack 2010) and in the future, they may in turn share the company information with a competing business (Lam and Khare, 2016). When a business task is outsourced this can hurt the workforce skillset and the organization may have challenges with less-skilled workers in the future (Moe et al. 2014) and it may also result in corporate knowledge within the organization being lost over some time (Olson and Wu, 2011). Outsourcing affects the privacy, security, or confidentiality of the information and leaves breaches (Lam and Khare, 2016). The study by Carson (2011) indicated that outsourcing reduces ingenuity in the organization in the longer term. 

Research Methodology

Three major methodologies are utilized by multiple researchers, these are qualitative methods, quantitative methods, and mixed methods Mackey and Gass (2015). Statistical analysis is conducted on logical and objective findings which are used in the quantitative research method to justify the outcome of the research (Jonker and Pennink, 2010). The qualitative method stresses subjective measures for studying the situation that involves critical argumentation and the perceptive view of various researchers (Flick, 2015). The Quantitative research method will be used for this research as statistical analysis and logical justification are the best techniques for data gathering for the upskilling of the BPTT employees.

Data Collection and Analysis

Primary and secondary data collection methods are tools available for the researcher to use (Dumay and Cai, 2015). The tools for collecting primary data are surveys, interviews, and observations (Mackey and Gass, 2015). The secondary data can be collected from internet sources such as magazines, books, articles, and journals (Jonker and Pennink, 2010). The current research will utilize both secondary and primary methods for collecting the data and proposes to employ statistical analysis such as regression and correlation analysis for analyzing the data. 

Sampling 

A survey sample of employees who are currently working with BPTT and their service providers would be conducted, would be conducted through a random sampling method where the target group would be selected randomly. A sample size of 30 is considered which would be collected from technicians, engineers, and managers working at BPTT. The focus group for the present study would be individuals with a good educational background, within the age group of 20 to 55 years, having a high income, and the Single Point Accountable (SPA) person for the delivery of the service. An effort will be made to gather sample information from the regulatory department (Ministry of Energy and Energy Affairs) the likelihood is low due to the timeframe to have the research completed.

Reliability and Validity

The data collected through the survey needs to be reliable to deduce precise results. To deal with reliability risk, multiple questions would be utilized in the questionnaire to collect the right information in the equivalent area this should portray consistent findings. Random sampling techniques would be employed the intent would be to avoid or minimize the possibility of biases in the data set collected through the survey method  (Blog, n.d.). 

Ethical Consideration

Emphasis would be placed on the ethical elements involved in the data collection for the research, where the sample group would be given appropriate details of the research and their identity would not be revealed. Data collected for the research would be used for this program only, participants would reserve the right to rescind their responses during the conduct of the research (Blog, n.d.).

Information Required

Cost for Contractor – Available from PSCM Department, via interview

Additional cost for flights – Available from the logistics department via interview

Time is taken to start activity (Booking contractor, scheduling a flight, flight time, etc.) Available from the work permit department and logistics 

Competency required to execute the task – available from the maintenance manager, via interview.

Cost to train existing employees – Available from maintenance manager via interview

Interviews will be conducted with the Maintenance Execution Manager to understand if there are any areas in the service where he would like to see improvements and understand if this can be integrated into this proposal.

I believe the most valuable information would come from the persons currently executing the task as they would be able to provide information as to what challenges they encounter doing their task and any areas they see improvements, unfortunately, I believe if I were to engage the contractor technicians they may feel threatened about their job security and may be hesitant to provide information and I don’t want my dissertation to cause unease and hysteria.